{"id":244575,"date":"2011-09-30T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-09-30T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/walter-cronkite-is-dead\/"},"modified":"2011-09-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-09-30T07:00:00","slug":"walter-cronkite-is-dead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/walter-cronkite-is-dead\/","title":{"rendered":"Walter Cronkite is Dead."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Walter<\/a>
(l to r) Melinda Gilb as Patty, Ellen Crawford as Margaret (Photo by Daren Scott)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Patricia Morris Buckley |<\/strong> Cr\u00edtico de Teatro SDUN<\/p>\n

San Diego Repertory Theatre\u2019s production of \u201cWalter Cronkite is Dead.\u201d is a prime example of style overcoming form. While Joe Calarco\u2019s two-person character piece is clunky and rough, the Rep\u2019s production goes a long way in making the audience forgive those flaws.<\/p>\n

\u201cWalter Cronkite is Dead.\u201d is one of those plays; characters trapped someplace unfamiliar with someone they\u2019d never be friends with in normal circumstances. But, as long as they\u2019re trapped, they pour their guts out to each other. It\u2019s a format that\u2019s a favorite of college playwriting students and even a few well-known playwrights (Tennessee Williams and Lanford Wilson come to mind).<\/p>\n

Calarco\u2019s characters are Patty, a chatterbox of a Southern, conservative woman who is not afraid voicing her strong, if often misinformed opinions. Margaret is an uptight East Coast liberal who values her privacy and her intense love of the Kennedys.<\/p>\n

They met in the bar at Reagan National Airport in Washington, D.C. Weather has delayed all flights and Patty guilts her way into sharing Margaret\u2019s table. They talk about kids, flying and the way that civility has fallen along the wayside (appointing Cronkite as the epitome of civility).<\/p>\n

This play is being advertised as a red state-blue state sort of comedy, but it\u2019s not really politics that are the sticky parts of their temporary relationship \u2014 it\u2019s the values of their viewpoints. Their politics merely inform their outlook and opinions. The playwright spends a lot of time giving us those opinions, but doesn\u2019t even tell us their jobs or professions. He is so honed in on conveying his \u201cmessage\u201d that if we sat down together, we could get along despite our radically different politics.<\/p>\n

That we come close to forgetting the rough patches is due to the Rep\u2019s excellent cast, direction and production values. San Diego favorite Melinda Gilb couldn\u2019t be better cast as the loud-mouthed Patty. Gilb\u2019s razor-sharp comedic timing and willingness to go just a bit overboard suits the busybody character well.<\/p>\n

While Ellen Crawford is best known as nurse Lydia Wright on \u201cER,\u201d local audiences saw another side of her in the Rep\u2019s \u201cWho\u2019s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?\u201d with her husband, Mike Genovese. Crawford plays Margaret\u2019s
\nuptight nature as though it\u2019s a religion, which makes her drunken revelations at the end all the more intriguing. But her best moment is when she tells about the ghosts of the Kennedys visiting Margaret and prompting her to have a fourth child \u2014 Crawford\u2019s Kennedy imitations are a scream.<\/p>\n

It says a lot about a designer when you walk into the theater and immediately know who designed the set. Sean Fanning excels with office-like environments, but this bar has an ebb and flow to it that keeps the table the women are at from becoming claustrophobic. Omar Ramos\u2019 constant track of background voices makes the airport seem more realistic, but he never makes its hum distracting or annoying. Ross Glanc\u2019s lights are like a mood ring, shifting to reflect the emotions in each scene.<\/p>\n

A director with a heavy touch would have reduced this show to a pedantic mess. But Shana Wride\u2019s brisk and nuanced direction is almost as civilized as Cronkite himself.<\/p>\n

While Calarco\u2019s script has little to recommend it, the same can\u2019t be said for the Rep\u2019s production. Skilled acting, direction and production values raise this show to something that\u2019s an enjoyable way to pass time between plane rides.<\/p>\n

Editors note: the period in the title is intentional.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Patricia Morris Buckley | SDUN Theater Critic San Diego Repertory Theatre\u2019s production of \u201cWalter Cronkite is Dead.\u201d is a prime example of style overcoming form. While Joe Calarco\u2019s two-person character piece is clunky and rough, the Rep\u2019s production goes a long way in making the audience forgive those flaws. \u201cWalter Cronkite is Dead.\u201d is […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":244576,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11555","_seopress_titles_title":"Walter Cronkite is Dead.","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11549,11551,11555],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-244575","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-entertainment","category-news","category-uptown-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244575","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244575\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244576"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}